Bengaluru sources have reported that when the staff at Bosco, an NGO working with children received a call saying they had seen a young girl being forcibly pushed into a car at a bus stop in Jayanagar, their reaction was instant and the caller had noted the number of the car and it was just a matter of time, before they informed the police, traced the address and arrived at the house.
When they demanded to see the girl, the owners pretended there was no one at the house, but the staff could see someone hovering in the background. They finally found the 13 year old girl from Mandya working as a domestic help, beaten up with bruises on her body. She had been left at the house to work there by her own poverty-stricken father. Meanwhile the changes made to the 1968 Act mean that police have been empowered to treat such incidents as cognizable offences.
Nagamani of Child Rights Trust, which is the nodal agency for Child line said “They come in groups, from children to 16 or 17 year olds mostly from Andhra Pradesh and all they do is ask directions to the garment factories and are determined to go ahead. All we can do is trying to discourage them, but it is very difficult to convince them”.
